Renn hurried out the door onto the roof, carrying our swords with a huge smirk.

Upon seeing me she quickly tried to control herself. She forced her smile to a more normal shape… or at least tried to. All she accomplished in doing was make her smile look quirky. She slowed her pace as she approached. It was odd she had her hat on still, yet had her tail out. Her tail was twitching, fully exposed now. A part of me wanted to chastise her, since there could have been a chance a human could have been up here as to clean up the mess or a straggler from the eastern girl’s ceremony… but I decided to let it be.

She knew I would have been here, after all. And... I liked that happy expression upon her. Especially since lately it had seemed to be missing, thanks to my own actions.

As the excited jaguar hurried up to me, I glanced over at the rising moon. It was bright, and although a storm was on the horizon it wasn’t that cold. The wind wasn’t strong, the air not chilly.

A good night to sweat a little.

“Did I make you wait?” she asked as she stepped up to the bench I sat on.

“Forever,” I said as she handed me my sword.

Her quirky smile adjusted, and then her tail twitched as she laughed.

Smiling at her, I watched as she took her hat off. She did so carefully, since it had been firmly pinned thanks to her having sat in the ceremony with the eastern girls. She had worried their festivities would have dislodged it accidentally.

“Did you enjoy the ceremony?” I asked her as she put her hat onto the bench next to me.

“I did. Even if I didn’t understand most of it,” she said.

I nodded. That probably had made it odd. Those eastern pagan rituals were weird enough as it were.

Renn had changed clothes before coming back. Probably one of the reasons she had taken a little longer than she should have. She now wore the leathers and boots that Lellip and Nebl had made her, instead of the dresses of the Animalia Company.

Standing up, I sighed as I hefted my sword. It was cold, for some reason.

Renn also drew her sword. She left the sheath on the bench and smiled at me. “Brom called it a scabbard,” she said.

“It is. I call it a sheath because that’s a short-sword. And it’s leather, not metal,” I told her.

“Oh?” Renn stared at it for a moment as I stepped away.

I had already cleaned up the mess left behind by the eastern girls. They really hadn’t made much of one, but I didn’t want anyone to become upset at Renn for not taking care of her dependents.

Though, we weren’t where they had their little ceremony. That was a little ways away, past the garden.

This was an open space, with benches scattered around the outer perimeter. A perfect place to spar. Flat. Open. Nothing to trip on.

A place that represented a rarely had battlefield.

“Let me see what Brom taught you,” I told her as I hefted my sword.

Renn smiled at me as she hurried to take a stance across from me. She raised her blade and put both hands on her handle.

She nodded, and I nodded back to let her know it was okay for her to start.

And start she did.

One moment she was in front of me, the next she was half a step away. She had ducked low, crouching, and with both hands was now preparing for a full frontal upwards swipe. Right in-between my legs. As if to slice me in two from the groin up.

Renn had a penchant for attacking from below. She instinctively knew that most men were not just taller than her, but had wider stances. She, without ever actually verifying it, seemed to know that most men wouldn’t be able to handle such a straight- forward attack to our nether regions.

Most men would try to side-step, or back step. The few who would try to just block, or parry, would be met with death. After all, most men didn’t have the strength to block or parry her sword. Either would have resulted in failure. Anyone who tried to escape, to the sides or away from her, would just get overwhelmed. She could move forward quicker than they could escape.

Yet I wasn’t most men. Nor was I inexperienced. I’ve fought countless people who were more adept and versatile when it came to attack patterns such as these.

With the point of my sword I kept her blade from reaching my groin, or legs. I had it skid and slide up the side of my blade, and then with a flick of the wrist sent it upward to my left. Her sword flung away from me, and caused her whole body to turn alongside it as it followed her momentum.

This was usually where she failed. This was where I’d usually consider kneeing her in the face, or stomach. Or maybe whacking her in the head with the blunt side of my sword… but it seemed she had learned a thing or two while sparring with Brom.

She spun with the momentum, and in the time it took a heart to beat she did a full rotation, and brought her sword back into position. She spun forward, and lunged. Her sword snapped forward, like a spear, straight at my sternum.

An attack that used not just the renewed momentum from my parry but even some of the forward momentum from her earlier leap at me.

It was a well done, flawless attempt. One that would have shocked the hell out of me had she done it before I had left her.

Once again I stabbed the side of her sword with the point of my own. The moment my blade connected with hers, I pushed and turned my own blade as to slide it along the side of her sword.

Her sword point went from pointing at the center of my chest, to harmlessly stabbing into the air a few inches from my head. I felt the powerful wind follow the stab as it blew past my ear, and into my hair.

Sliding my sword’s edge along hers, I swung my blade as if to cut her. I watched as her cat-shaped irises became slim in shock as she skidded to a stop and with a weird noise she delved to the right, as to duck my own attack.

“Gwak!” she scoffed as she inhaled and exhaled in quick succession, pulling her sword away as she dodged my own attack and hurried to step backward out of my reach.

If I had pursued, it would have been over. She took three steps back, and it wasn’t until the third before she got her sword back in front of her and ready to defend herself.

With a huff she blew some hair out of her face. It really had grown longer since I had seen her.

Odd. Our kind’s hair usually didn’t grow that quickly. Especially those like her, who was obviously thick in the blood of their ancestors.

Her nails grew quickly too. They looked ready for another one of her cutting and polishing sessions.

“You didn’t even move,” she complained as she glared at me.

“I did?” I asked her. Did she not see me swinging my sword?

“Your feet, I mean,” she corrected.

“I hadn’t needed to.”

Renn grumbled, but didn’t argue.

Smiling at her, I wondered if I should voice my praise to her or not.

I wanted her to know I was impressed. I wanted to praise her, to the sky and back… but a warrior didn’t grow with praise.

Yet… did I want her to become a warrior?

“Did you attack Brom that fiercely?” I asked her.

“Huh…? Oh… Um…” Renn shifted, and swapped the position of her hands on her sword’s handle. She went from having her right on the top, to putting her left in first position. Was she planning on attacking me from the right this time?

“Yes and no. I… I did get a little emotional a few times. And when I did, I think I overdid it. But normally no, I didn’t put as much strength into my blows… usually,” she said.

Hm… “That would explain the faint bruises. Did he hit you?” I asked.

I had already known that Renn had been… difficult for Brom. One of the first things he had told me upon my return was that she was someone he couldn’t properly train. She was too strong for him. He couldn’t completely block her blows without resorting to throwing or forcefully stopping her attacks. Which meant their sparring ended up with one of them actually getting hurt. Either him or her.

Should I tell her about his broken bones?

“Well, he’d throw me sometimes. Make me fall on my back. He never hurt me on purpose,” Renn said quickly.

Oh? Was she defending him because she was worried I’d be upset, or because she didn’t want me to think she was embarrassed over her failing to beat him?

Brom was a good man. To not hurt her, even though she had so obviously harmed him. So obviously endangered him, and made him fight for his life.

“How’d it feel being thrown by a meerkat?” I asked.

“Meerkat?” she asked.

“You didn’t know?” I asked.

“Know what?” she shifted. She was now looking at my waist. Why did she seem to favor attacking me from the legs?

“Brom and his sister are meerkats. A mongoose. Small animals, barely bigger than a rabbit,” I told her.

Renn stopped planning her next attack and stood up a little taller. Her ears turned a little, to face me more directly. “Small?” she asked.

I nodded. “Weasels. They’re categorized as predators, but in reality they’re as feeble as most of the rest of our members,” I told her.

“Feeble…” Renn’s face contorted as I watched her realize what I was implying.

Yes, Renn. The man you had spent more than a week sparring with, and failing to defeat, was not strong. Not a true predator.

“He was weaker than me. But it didn’t matter. He still beat me,” she said.

“Strength isn’t everything,” I said, glad she understood. So few predators ever did. They thought strength was everything.

Renn lowered her sword point, and shifted her feet. To stand more appropriately.

Her stance reminded me of Reatti’s. Had she sparred with her too? Impossible… she had said she hadn’t…

Then Renn charged forward.

Flipping my sword upward, I blocked her first blow. One aimed at my right side, near my waist. Then she pulled her sword back, and with a burst of speed stabbed at me five different times. She tried to stab my face, my shoulder, my thigh and stomach in quick succession.

I parried each stab, and on the final one she stepped to the right and then hefted her sword to bring it down onto my shoulder. A heavy, hard, blow. One that probably had worked on Brom.

He was quick, but didn’t have the strength to continuously block such a flurry of blows.

It was probably right here, in this moment, that Brom would hit her. Either a kick to the stomach, since it was exposed with her sword hefted high, or he’d step in to grab her by the wrist and fling her onto her back.

I did neither. I let her blade come straight down.

Letting it hit the spot on my blade right before my hilt, I let her blade skid down my own blade as I diverted her sword’s path. It ended up skidding off my blade and nearly hitting the tiled rooftop floor, and before she could suck in air as to renew her efforts…

I reached out and flicked her in the ear. One of the big ones, on the top of her head.

She yelped and hurried away, stepping away more than back-stepping as a hand shot up to touch her ears.

“Jeez,” she glared at me as her ears flicked wildly and she rubbed them.

“If it wouldn’t work on Brom, why would you try it on me?” I asked her.

“You wanted to know how I had attacked him, so I just…” she flinched as she rubbed her ears some more. Maybe I had flicked it too hard.

“Ah...” I realized what she meant.

She had simply been showing me what she had done with Brom. To make him panic and resort to other methods to stop her.

Woops…

“I see. So did you just keep trying the same methods? The whole time?” I asked her.

Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

“No. Not at all. I tried a lot of things,” she complained.

“Then show me,” I said and gestured for her to continue.

She grumbled, scratched her ears wildly for a moment… and then nodded. Even as she took a stance, her right ear still flicked a little as if annoyed.

I’d need to apologize later.

Renn spent the next few engagements showing how she had tried to defeat Brom. Of the few dozen she displayed, I noticed the five that had probably worked.

The one’s that had resulted in Brom’s broken bones, shattered wrists, and fractured his legs.

After one last display, right as I stepped around Renn as she spun forward, losing momentum thanks to my parry, I stepped away from her as to let her know to take a moment to rest.

She skidded on a heel, and then relaxed as she saw the way I had lowered my blade and begun to pace around her. She took a small defensive stance as I begun to circle her, studying her.

“I wish I had found you ages ago, Renn,” I said.

Her ears perked up, and I noticed the way the one I had flicked twitched. It was still bothered. I must have hurt her.

She tilted her head at me as I nodded at her. “Before this age, at least. Maybe not the age before that one… and definitely not the era before that,” I said.

Renn’s eyes stayed focused on me even as I rounded her. She turned her head to keep her eyes one mine, and even begun to turn around when needed. Something that if we had still been sparring, I would have chastised her for. You never took your eyes off your enemy, but should also never let your neck and head cause you to become so un-centered by straining them in such a way.

“I wish so too, but I’m not that old Vim,” she told me.

“I know. But all the same… You would have done well in that era. Before our Society fractured. Before the humans ruled,” I said.

She frowned in a way that told me she didn’t really understand, or maybe even care for what I was saying.

Renn was… emotional. But she was a realist. She didn’t think of what could have been, just what might be.

She wept when disaster struck, but never got stuck in the past because of it.

“I think you would have made a difference,” I told her. “I think you would have been… very…” I stopped talking as I realized there was no point to tell her. She couldn’t imagine the world in the past. Few could anymore, since only a handful even remembered it.

“I’m here now, Vim,” she said to me.

I nodded. “You are.”

“I’m glad you’re here now too, Vim,” Renn then said.

“Oh?”

She nodded, her tail twitching. A small breeze came by, making her hair flow in the wind a little. “I hope… my not being able to beat Brom doesn’t make you abandon me here. I hope you’ll still give me a chance,” she said.

I stopped walking for a second, and she noticed instantly. She stood up straighter, and squeezed her grip on her sword. She thought I was about to charge at her.

“You didn’t fail to beat him, Renn,” I told her.

“Yes I did… If he told you otherwise, he’s just being kind. He is a kind boy,” she said.

Boy. They were the same age, roughly. She needed to stop comparing other men to me. I was a poor standard, if one at all.

“Brom has broken arms and legs. Shattered wrists. A fractured femur, amongst other wounds,” I told her.

Renn at first didn’t register what I had said… but then she did. Her sword lowered, and her shoulder slumped as she stared at me with her wide, gleamy eyes.

“He’s hurt?” she asked, worriedly.

“You should know. You’re the one who had hurt him,” I said.

Her eyes narrowed as her ears fluffed around. “What…? Vim? What do you mean?” She stepped forward as she asked what I meant.

I returned to my pacing, which only made her glare at me. “You didn’t fail Renn. You broke him. Dozens of times,” I said.

“Impossible…” she whispered as she stopped walking towards me.

“No it’s not. You broke your fingers, Renn… yet look at them now. Only a couple days later and now able to hold that sword as tightly as ever,” I said with a glance to her hands.

I liked how her hands gripped her sword. She held it firmly, yet with a grace that most couldn’t.

Renn quickly lifted her hand, opening her hand with a big stretch to stare at the digits she had broken. “Don’t say they hadn’t been broken. I had felt them break on my nose,” I teased her.

She took a deep breath, but shook her head instead of saying anything.

“He’s not as… well, Renn, to be honest he’s just simply a little too human. He has our strength. As does his sister. But they’re not as apt as you. He’s more like… well… Lellip, than you,” I said as I tried to compare him to anyone she knew or had met recently.

Lellip had fit the bill close enough.

“I never beat him, Vim!” she yelled at me as she stepped towards me.

“You did. How many times did he throw you, Renn?” I asked.

She hesitated, and seemed to delve into herself. To scour her memories. “Thrown…” she whispered as she pondered.

“Actual throws. Where you had probably even been tossed to the ground?” I asked further.

“Twenty one times,” her striking memory quickly answered her.

“Well… then you beat Brom twenty one times, Renn,” I told her.

She shook her head as she stepped closer to me. “Vim…”

“The reason Brom had thrown you those times, Renn… is because you had been about to hurt him. Or hurt yourself. Maybe even endanger his life. He resorted to using those techniques, to grappling and throwing, to avoid getting hurt or hurting you in response. It was an instinctual self-preservation method,” I told her.

Brom had been brutality honest, after all.

“Vim!” Renn screamed at me, and stepped towards me.

I kept walking around, in the same circle I had started. “His arms are busted. His fingers had been mangled. His legs fractured. I think he shattered a hip too, though it was mostly healed by the time I checked him out,” I said lightly, ignoring Renn’s approach.

“No...! Vim!” Renn dropped her sword. It clanged just twice before coming to a rest on the floor of the roof, and she left it there as she hurried up to me.

I came to a stop as she stepped right up to me, and grabbed me by the shirt.

She wasn’t tall enough to grab me precisely on the collar, but she had done so a little below it. She pulled my shirt as if to pull me towards her, to bring us face to face... but I didn’t let myself get budged.

I held my ground, and went still.

For the tiniest moment I thought she was about to rip my shirt and the leather bracer I wore above it off my chest. Yet she stopped, right as it begun to tear near my right shoulder. She noticed I wasn’t letting her get any closer.

She growled at me, and stepped closer as to stand on the tip of her toes and glare at me.

“Don’t hate him for not saying it, Renn. He didn’t want to admit to you how badly you had hurt him. He was... also unsure of what to say or do, since I was gone. He didn’t know if I wanted you to know yet, or not,” I said, defending Brom while also trying to keep her rage at herself in check.

Renn suddenly groaned as her glare faltered, and she looked down a moment... to stare at my nape.

I could read her emotions clearly. She wasn’t just upset at me, for keeping it a secret... and Brom of course, but was more so angry at herself.

She had hurt someone that she considered a friend, and hadn’t even realized it.

“Then... why did he keep sparring with me? Why didn’t he stop or...?” she whispered at herself.

“His injuries aren't that bad, Renn. They'll heal soon, just as your fingers did. Just as my torn cheek did from your blow the other day.” he said.

She slapped me.

My head turned, and tilted, to roll along with her sudden attack. The quiet night became loud for a heartbeat as the sound of her palm against the side of my face echoed throughout town.

“Don’t keep such things from me!” she screamed at me, and re-grabbed me by the shirt.

Looking back at her, I frowned. “I hadn’t. I had just told you,” I said.

“Days later!”

Renn was furious. She was glaring at me with livid eyes which were tinged with tears. I was about to smile at her, and her sudden adorable beauty, but I noticed the way her shoulder tensed.

If I smiled now, she’d slap me again.

“I’m sorry Renn. We have been busy. Plus you had been upset with me, for most of the first day I had been back...” I said to her gently.

Her tail puffed from anger, nearly doubling in size from its standard... then her eyes wavered and... narrowed... then...

With a heavy sigh she closed her eyes and looked away from me, as if in defeat.

“Is he really not hurt badly?” she asked me. Seemed she had understood I had not done such a thing on a purpose. I mean... it really had only been a couple days. And most of that time we had been busy. If not apart from one another, but dealing with people and in places we couldn’t talk openly. Like with those eastern women.

I nodded; even though she wasn’t looking at me I knew she could hear me. Especially with us this close. Her ears were eye level with me. “You're free to go see him after this... or well, tomorrow. He goes to sleep early, Renn. Plus if you do go ask to see his injuries, do so gently. He's a meerkat, but has a lot of pride. Half the reason he hadn't told you and hadn’t let you know that you had been hurting him was simple pride. He was ashamed, embarrassed,” I said.

“A foolish male,” she whispered.

“There’s… more to it than that, Renn,” I warned.

Her ears danced on her head, as she heard more than just my words. She had heard my emotion. She looked up, with eyes that told me she was willing to hear me out.

She still held me by the shirt, which was odd. She was still angry at me, it seemed.

Was this going to become habit? Normal? Was this her more normal temperament, and had only finally surfaced because of our relationship becoming more founded… or was this because I was just being an ass to her and not realizing it? Maybe this was my entire fault. Maybe I was just being inconsiderate.

She was normally so gentle, even when angry.

Though, granted… she knew her slaps didn’t hurt me. Couldn’t.

Yet everyone else knew that too, and none of them did such a thing either.

In fact she’s the first to actually act like this towards me in…

“Well?” she asked. She was tired of me staring at her, it seemed.

Too bad. I was enjoying the view.

“He’s this location’s guard, Renn,” I said.

She blinked. A heavy blink, that sent a tear down the right side of her face. “Huh…” she whispered.

I nodded. “Brom’s the guard. Of the company. Of here. Of our members here, he has taken up the mantle as their protector. For when I’m not here,” I explained.

Renn’s quick mind, even when wrapped in anger, worked swiftly. It was amusing to watch her eyes go wide as she understood my complete meaning.

Although she obviously knew what I meant, I still went ahead and explained it aloud. “If he told you that you were too strong for him, and were hurting him… Others might hear it. Since you obviously don’t know everything about our Society, or how it works, he was worried about what to say or do in front of you. As most are. If they learned how weak he was, from you or otherwise, then…” I shrugged, which only made my shirt rip at my right shoulder. The seam she had stretched had given way, since she was still pulling on my shirt with balled fists.

We both ignored it as she went into deep thought. She groaned as her tail coiled, and lost most of its density. Its hairs going back to the smooth silky state they usually were.

I nodded as she understood.

“They’d run away Renn. If those here thought he couldn’t protect them… if he was weak, or even just seen as too weak, they’d not trust him. He would lose his place, and then most here would scatter. To the corners. If they thought they were suddenly not safe… well…” I nodded as I finished explaining it to her.

“They would,” Renn agreed with a dull voice.

“They would.”

She gulped.

“It’s also… my fault. I have a lot of blame in this, Renn. I honestly had not thought you’d be that strong. I should have, I mean… I’ve been sparring with you for months. And I’ve been watching and studying you. I was even the one to train Brom and his sister. I should have known exactly where you all stood when paired together. I had no idea you’d actually push him to such limits, Renn. I’m sorry. I really am,” I said.

Suddenly she was upset again. She firmed her grip and snarled at me. “So you had wanted me to lose!” she shouted.

Damn. She had almost let me go too…

“Well, no. I had expected you to receive enough praise from him that I’d concede. Meet you in the middle. Praise you for your hard work and efforts, yet also be able to tell you that you had much to learn and so forth,” I admitted.

Renn’s eyes bore into my own as she searched for something. Maybe something to slap. Yet no slap came, and I sighed after a moment of her glaring.

“Please Renn, do not get angry at him or yourself. Brom is fine. He will heal quickly. Just let this all… pass without a word. For his sake, and your own,” I asked her.

For a tiny moment she seemed to consider it, and then she frowned at me.

“If you’re lying to me I’m going to bite you,” she warned.

Smiling at her, I reached out and wrapped my hands around her wrists. Her own grip on my clothes tightened, as if she dared me to try and pry her off. But I didn’t. I just… grabbed her wrists, gently. As if I was holding her hands.

Her wrists were thin. Common for a woman, yet… surprising all the same. Especially since she was pulling on my clothes with the strength of ten grown men.

“You’re strong Renn. In more ways than one… even if you do seem to cry at the drop of a hat,” I said.

“Only because life keeps slapping it off my head without permission,” she countered.

“That is true,” I nodded. Everyone was getting slapped it seemed.

“And then there’s this jerk who flicks my ears when I don’t have one on, too,” she added. Her ears flicked quickly, as if to make a point.

“That is also true… Did I fail to mention that flicking you like that had hurt my soul? I regret it,” I said.

Renn held my gaze, and after a moment her eyes shook… as if about to cry… then she flinched and her ears begun to twitch. She sighed and then shifted a little, to put weight on one heel… and then she went to staring at my hands. They were right in front of her, thanks to the way we were standing.

I stared at her eyes that stared at my fingers, and I wondered what she was studying. My grip? Where to bite? The scars?

“How much stronger than Brom am I?” she asked while looking at my hands.

“I can't say. I wouldn't know without doing some tests, but I’d say at least twice more. He said some of your attacks he could not block because of how much force you had behind them. Thus his throwing of you, to negate the attack and keep both you and him safe,” I said.

“And how much stronger are you than me?” Renn asked me.

For the tiniest moment… I considered squeezing my hands.

But I didn’t.

Even if she’d heal. Even if she’d forgive me.

She must have noticed my thoughts for she looked up at my eyes… and then back down at my hands. She squirmed in my grip, but didn’t let go of my clothes.

“That... Renn, is the entire reason I had not properly calculated the difference between him and you. To me you're both stronger than most, but not by much,” I told her. Renn's jaw clenched, yet she... seemed to not get more angry at that, but instead actually started to smile. As if she found such a thing positive, not a negative. “Strength is meaningless after a certain point, Renn,” I then added.

Her eyebrow tilted in a way that made me smirk.

“Did you just think of slapping me again?” I asked her. She hadn’t moved or shifted her arms, but she had definitely had that look on her face.

“I did,” she smiled as she nodded.

“Just to warn you, I might start liking it,” I warned her.

Renn blinked, and leaned back onto her heel away from me. Suddenly she wasn’t as close anymore. I couldn’t feel her hot breath now, which was too bad.

For a very… strangely comfortable moment, she gave me a steely look, and then sighed at me.

She had realized I had only been partly teasing her.

“If strength isn't everything... why are you teaching me this? Why did you have me spar with Brom?” she asked.

“For you, Renn,” I whispered.

“Me?”

My hands finally moved. They moved upward, as if to pry her hands free from my shirt... but they hadn't needed to. She let my shirt go, so I could take her hands into my own.

“So you can survive, even without me,” I said. She and I both ignored how my shirt became loose, thanks to being torn and stretched out.

Renn’s eyes went wide, and this time even without a heavy blink a tear slid free. It slowly ran down the left side of her face, glistening the entire way.

Her hands trembled, but they weren’t cold. They were warm. Blazingly warm.

I almost hated how… at place they felt in my own.

“Please, Renn. Become strong. Become wise. Shine as brilliantly as you can, for as long as you can. I care not if it's for the Society or for yourself... but just do so. Do it, since so many won't. Since so many can't,” I told the woman who looked too precious for this world.

Another tear fell as she slowly nodded. Her fingers slithered within my grip, until they found my own. She coiled her hands into mine, squeezing them tightly as she held my gaze.

“Stand tall,” She whispered.

I nodded. “Stand tall.”

For those who couldn't.